Following on from last month’s update, here’s an overview of my progress in February.
The weather was decent this month, but I had fewer weekend opportunities for cycling. I only rode 35 miles — 14 of those commuting — and I’ll have to ride more to make up for that. My bike is all set up for commuting and I just started riding to work again. Fenders are a good thing this time of year. If I continue to commute by bike the miles will add up quickly; it’s about 7 miles round trip for any day I ride.
Because I’m training for a half marathon in a few weeks I couldn’t let weather stop me from running. I’ve put on a huge number of miles this month, all according to the plan. The race is in 3 weeks, and 13.1 miles will be hard for me even with the training. I’m looking forward to backing the weekly miles down after this date and settling into more of a routine.
I’ve been very slow on weight loss. I don’t have anything to blame really, other than my own diligence. I just have to keep working at it. I know it looks steady in the table but the real progress has been rough and halting.
Summary
Activity
2014 Goal
February
To Date
Progress
Running
600 miles
80 miles
126 miles
21%
Cycling
1,000 miles
35 miles
117 miles
12%
Weight Loss
40 pounds
3 pounds
6 pounds
15%
Thoughts (worries)
I’ve made a real lifestyle change. I’m running regularly, often, and for long distances. I am much fitter than I have been in years. A 5 or 6 mile run doesn’t intimidate me at all. I just go for it. The 13.1 miles of a half marathon is going to be an incredible challenge, but it isn’t impossible. Even a year ago it would have seemed so.
But even with this obvious progress, I don’t always feel as strong as I think I should. My long runs are at a fairly slow pace. Shouldn’t I be faster? I am losing weight, and my clothes fit better. I still feel huge. Running doesn’t feel easy or joyful, except for brief odd moments. Mostly I feel like I’m plodding along.
Motivation is hard. Seeing progress is hard, even with data. All the metrics in the world can’t get over the perception of progress. And I’m scared about this upcoming race: scared that I bit off more than I can chew. 10 miles is hard. How can I do 13? I don’t know. I just hope that the training will prepare me.
I’m going to stick with the plan, and keep checking in. I appreciate any support.
I wrote about my goals for 2014 earlier this month. January is over now so I’m posting an update on my progress.
We had fantastic weather on several weekends this month. I was able to take advantage of this and get a good start on 2014’s cycling goal. Running was less weather dependent since I am committed to my training plan.
Even if it is raining or snowing I’ll still go running. Last night I ran 3 miles through both. And if the trails aren’t safe I’m resigned to heading to the gym and using a treadmill to stay on track.
Weight loss is the hardest goal, but I’ve been mostly good about tracking what I eat and the trend is moving in the right direction.
Summary
Activity
2014 Goal
January
Progress
Running
600 miles
46 miles
8%
Cycling
1,000 miles
82 miles
8%
Weight Loss
40 pounds
3 pounds
8%
Not bad for a cold month. I expect a lot of running miles in February, and with any luck enough nice days to keep the cycling number going up.
My first beer of 2014 is what I call a Colorado style pale ale. To me this is defined by Dale’s Pale Ale from Oskar Blues in Longmont and Colorado Kind Ale from Mountain Sun in Boulder. It’s an amber to red American pale ale that could be considered an IPA. I don’t know what the recipes of those two excellent beers are, but with my most recent brew I tried to create something in that style.
I went for a simple set of grain and hops. I’m using mostly 2-row barley malt, with dark crystal malt for color and some flavor. And I’m using only Cascade hops, the essential American hop. I used mostly flavor and aroma additions with just enough bittering hops to keep it in the style range for an IPA. I also plan to dry hop for 1 — 2 weeks before bottling. Hopefully I’ll have a nicely colored hop forward beer with a good malt balance. I’ll find out in 6 — 8 weeks.
The recipe
Once again this is specific to my patio setup. I get 75% extraction efficiency, and aim for 5 gallon batches at the end of the entire brewing process. But I target 6 gallons of wort in the kettle at the end of the boil. Why? Because I lose about half a gallon in the kettle, and I want to get 5.5 gallons in the primary fermenter if I can. Then I can be confident in a final batch size of 5 gallons. Maybe if I had less waste I could buy less grain.
I made a lot of progress last year. I ran 540 miles and lost about 20 pounds. But I didn’t cycle nearly as much as I planned or wanted to. I set several goals for 2014, and I hope to improve on everything from last year.
These aren’t really “New Year’s Resolutions” though. I’m simply updating existing yearly goals, not pledging to make radical changes. Years are convenient markers, after all.
I set specific distance goals for cycling and running. Since I ran 540 miles last year I set a goal to run 600 miles this year. As long as I continue on my current path I’ll hit that without a problem. I need only run about 12 miles a week, and I am fairly diligent in keeping to 4 runs a week.
I signed up for two road races this spring and plan to sign up for more. As I wrote before, I am running the Spring Fever half marathon in Golden in March. I also signed up for the Bolder Boulder 10k in May. I’m hoping to run the Dam to Dam half marathon in Iowa too, but I haven’t registered yet. I hope to do other 5k and 10k runs but I haven’t made plans.
I set a goal to ride 1,000 miles this year. Last year I tallied less than 250 miles, which is far too low. 1,000 miles is only 20 miles a week and is achievable, so I’m going for it. I know this will be harder than my running goal unless I get in a habit of riding during the working week, but I haven’t done that in years. If I only ride on weekends, then trips and bad weather can quickly cut into riding time. If that happens my weekly goal will have to increase. I have no plans to register for formal cycling events this year.
I set a goal to lose 40 pounds, which would bring me into the normal weight range for my height. This will be the hardest goal by far. I know how to do it, but sticking with my plans is a lot harder than you might think. While I’m confident I can make the running and cycling goals I’m less certain about this one. Running and cycling will help, but I must be diligent about what I eat, too.
I’ll let you know how it goes. Maybe I can post a monthly or quarterly update. Wish me luck.
I’m back in Iowa for Christmas this week. I got home on Saturday evening, and it snowed overnight. And last night the cold, cold air moved in and brought temperatures way down.
The air was in single digits this morning, but the sun was bright. I put on a coat, hat and gloves and drove out to East River Valley Park for a walk. I wasn’t the only one braving the cold bright air. I met a man walking two beautiful dogs, one young and eager, the other older with more fur than dog. Several other people were strapping on cross country skis to keep themselves warm while sliding through the snow.
Though the air was cold the sun was warm, casting blue shadows on the sparkling snow. I walked up the trail along the river, then followed a branch to an open field. Tall grass and signs of animal life. I walked farther, feet in the ruts left by the skiers, until I found myself in the right-of-way of a transmission line. I saw a birdhouse, but couldn’t tell if anyone was home. Then I heard the cry of a hawk. He was hunting in a snowy farmer’s field, using the transmission pole as a perch while he looked for his small brown prey. I watched him for a while, until he flew off down the line, maybe to find better hunting grounds.
By then I was getting cold. Though I had hat and gloves I wore trail shoes and thin socks, not warm enough for the cold seeping in from the ground and snow. With no better ideas, I started running. I missed a scheduled run yesterday anyways. I felt a little silly, running through the snow in jeans and a fedora, but it worked. Warmth worked its way through me from head to foot, down to my numb toes and fingers.
I worked my way back along the trail, down the river this time and back to the car. Then down the road to the coffee shop to warm myself back up. A cold day, but not a wasted one.
I decided that the Old Ale I have aging in the corner needs a bit more time to mature. Instead I will bring home a nice brown ale and the rest of my Farmhouse ale for Christmas instead.. As I learned from my SMaSH English Bitter a simple recipe can make a lovely been when quality ingredients are used.
What I hope I have here is a flavorful, malty English brown that my mom will like (and I will like too). As brewers we sometimes seem so focused on hoppy beers that we dismiss the simple but good styles like browns and bitters.
So here is a very English brown ale, of the Northern (Newcastle) style. It is now ready to drink, and is a deep brown, crystal clear when poured gently, and softly carbonated. It’s not perfect, but I’m happy with the result, and look forward to sharing with family and friends.
The recipe:
This recipe was tuned for my simple brewing system where I can get a 75% mash efficiency consistently. I calculated 78% efficiency for this particular mash. I think if I were to track this more rigorously I would see a nearly 5% efficiency difference between the two grain mills at the supply shop. I’m going to put getting my own mill on my list of brewery upgrades.
I spent a good portion of 2012 testing a number of cameras, trying to find the right one for me. Late last year I purchased the Fujifilm X-E1 based on good reviews, a very successful rental of the similar X-Pro1, and a lens lineup founded on high quality primes. I bought into a system that was in its infancy but showed potential. I bought based on hope and promises for the future.
I have now had the camera for a year and have taken thousands of pictures. I have used every R-series[1] Fuji prime lens released for the system to date, and I own the standard zoom lens. I have taken pictures in all conditions, from desert sand at midday to icy cold at midnight. It has a few dings and scratches now but still looks good. And I am still extremely happy with the camera.
A big upgrade
The X-E1 is a huge upgrade from my old Olympus E-410. I used to avoid shooting at any sensitivity higher than 400 ISO unless I had to, relying instead on tripods or (often poor) attempts to be steady in low light. When I did give in and use the higher sensitivities I found the noise extremely distracting. I could massage and filter it to make it slightly better, but could never get it to a point where the noise was anything but distracting. Color noise was so bad I would convert pictures to black & white out of desperation. Now I can go outside and shoot handheld in the dead of night at 3200 ISO and the noise still compares favorably to the grain of scanned 400 and 800 speed film, both in level and aesthetics. It certainly doesn’t fundamentally change my photography, but it gives me more opportunities.
Delays and software problems
It hasn’t all been roses, of course. Part of why I chose the Fuji over other options was the highly regarded lenses. Which is absolutely true about the 35mm “normal” lens I bought with the camera. But part of why I hesitated was just how limited the lens lineup was. Yes I bought the camera with the excellent 35mm f/1.4 prime, but I half bought it on the promise of a future 23mm prime, a 35mm equivalent moderate wide angle lens that gives probably my favorite angle of view of all time. Which took a good 6 months longer to show up than initially planned. And is bigger than expected. And about $200 more expensive than I guessed.
I used the 23mm in the a Twin Cities last month. Optically it is everything that I was promised (fantastic) and I definitely plan to buy it. But I can’t impulse buy a $900 lens.
And I’m still waiting for the fast portrait prime I was promised. I tried the existing portrait length lens and it takes nice pictures, but it is slow to focus and frustrating. If the promised future lens is anything like the new 23mm I will probably buy that too.
In addition to that I bought the camera knowing that Adobe Lightroom, my photo software of choice, had serious flaws in its handling of raw files from the Fuji’s strange sensor. I started out using Lightroom for web sized images, but spending a lot of time in Fuji’s strange and unintuitive raw converter for any image I wanted to print.
Thankfully it wasn’t long before updates to Adobe Camera Raw and Lightroom arrived. Although I can still pull more fine detail from a file using Fuji’s software Lightroom is now extremely competitive. And far easier to use.
The risk pays off
I took a risk buying a camera that was great on its own, but with an unusual sensor and part of a system in its infancy. Buying from Canon or Nikon or even Sony would probably have been more sensible.
What if Fuji didn’t last, or support from Adobe lagged, or the lenses I was waiting for were inferior? What if third party lens makers like Zeiss ignored the platform? What if minor software issues were actually real world showstoppers?
I might just be lucky that isn’t the case. Or I might have seen the real potential in a fledgling system that was embraced by others. I’m happy with my camera, but it could have turned out very different.
— Steve
The R-series lenses have dedicated aperture control rings, whether marked with end stops (all prime lenses) or freely rotating (the zoom lenses). There are other lower-cost Fuji lenses without the aperture control ring, which I have not used.↩︎
A year has passed since I took up running. I discussed my reasons back in February. I started with a typical “Couch to 5k” plan last November. The only thing it asked of me on that first day last winter was to run 60 seconds at a stretch, then give my self another 90 seconds to recover by walking. Easy! Except that it wasn’t.
As simple as that sounds it wore me out. I remember being exhausted, out of breath, and coughing on the second day. I was on the trail for half an hour but only spent 8 minutes running. And it was hard.
But I stuck with it. Progress was rapid, almost amazingly so. Three months later I finished my first 5k run. Six weeks after that I finished a 5k at a 10 minute mile pace. In July I ran the 10k race at Midnight Madness in Ames. Progressing from 5k to 10k was nearly as difficult as getting from 0 to 5k was.
But after completing that 10k I worried about stopping. I know others who did their planned 5k or 10k runs, called it good, and stopped. I didn’t want to join that club; I’m in this for my health and fitness for the long term.
But without a firm goal I tend to coast. After the 10k I spent a couple months running but I didn’t feel I was improving. So here is my next challenge: I am training for a half marathon in the spring. I started this training in early October, and plan to race in March. The training started light and slow, mostly working on endurance, but now I’m starting some speed work with interval training. I’m taking a few days off because I hurt something in my foot, but I plan to be back on the trail soon. I have a long time to get ready for the race, but I’m still nervous and I think it will still be difficult.
That’s my progress so far. In one year I went from being exhausted nearly to the point of falling over after a short run to training for a half-marathon. I went from 25 miles a month of total distance to a high of over 90 miles in August. Since then I’ve pulled back on the total distance, with shorter weekday runs and longer Sunday runs, but as I get closer to the race in March that distance should go up. All told I have traveled over 500 miles on the trails in one year I have been running. While each run doesn’t seem like a lot they add up to a huge achievement.
I haven’t written in a while, so I thought I’d give a general update of what I’ve done so far this fall. I traveled far more often than usual in the last two months, and wrote less often than I intended.
South Carolina
Although technically still summer, I’m going to count our post Labor Day vacation. I joined my entire family, some for more time and some for less, on a beach vacation in South Carolina. We rented a large house on Folly Beach with some friends, and spent a week exploring the sand, the water, and the historic city of Charleston.
During the trip we spent time on the beach, visited Fort Moultrie, saw downtown Charleston several times, explored areas that were destroyed by Hurricane Hugo before my Dad’s first trip that have since been rebuilt, ate and drank at several restaurants, and a bunch of other things. We even made a delicious home cooked meal of fresh grilled fish, farmers’ market vegetables, and shrimp.
I don’t take many real vacations, and this was my first in years. It was fantastic, and I even bought a fancy new hat to celebrate.
Portland (round 1)
I got home from vacation on the 11th, and the next weekend I turned around and flew out to Portland for my friend Hilary’s wedding. I’ve known Hilary for years, but before her wedding had never met her husband. They started dating just before the last time I went to Portland, and I hadn’t had a chance to head back there since.
After the wedding Michael and I took Sunday afternoon to explore the Japanese Garden tucked into the hills of Portland. It was raining but still beautiful. Another Flicker photo set awaits.
Beerpig 2013
The very next weekend I turned around again and flew to Des Moines for the second annual Beerpig celebration at Andy’s house. Beerpig is a celebration of pork and beer, and this year featured homebrew from me, Ben, and Andy, along with amazing pork, lovely salad, and incredible cornbread.
I got my beer home by stuffing an entire case of homebrew into a box and putting that in my duffel bag to carry home. I was just under the 50 pound weight limit, and didn’t have to pay anything extra. Shipping beer by plane is totally OK, but just in case the unlabeled bottles worried anyone I even wrote a nice note to the TSA inspectors describing the beers which they never read.
I stayed with Andy and Lindsey (and little Nico) through the weekend. My parents came to the party, which was a little weird because several of my worlds then collided.
If you guessed I’d have another Flickr link, you’re right.
TAGTOBER 2013
I traveled less in October than September. We started up another round of our bi-annual photo contest/project called TAGTOBER, where we try to take a picture every day during October and put it up to share, to comment on, and to vote on our favorites.
2 years ago we didn’t have a formal site, and so I did this as a personal project. This year we got pretty good participation. I missed one day last week because I was in Portland and 11 pm rolled by before I realized it. Otherwise I have done pretty well. It’s hard to find something artistic every day with work and life orbiting around you.
Colorado Springs is only an hour away, but somehow I never find the time to go down there. I don’t know why, but even though it is close it feels far. But I wanted to take pictures of the rocks in the sunrise for this year’s TAGTOBER contest. My friend John lives in the Springs, and I met him a little after 6 am on an overlook above the Garden of the Gods park.
I love John, and don’t get to see him often enough. We both had our cameras out, and watched the sun rise together. After that we headed into the park for a little more photography and hiking. The morning sun on the rocks was amazing, and we met a number of small birds including some lovely blue birds. I put yet another set of photos up on Flickr.
Portland (round 2)
Within a month of the wedding I found myself back in Portland last week. I was supporting a client on some project work and took the opportunity to stay the weekend and see Hilary again. This time I got the chance to spend some time with Albert and get to know him a little better.
He’s something of an odd fellow, but seems generous and fun. We attended an 80s music video dance party, had a nice dinner, and visited a few local breweries. The weather in Portland was foggy in the mornings but pleasant overall. Saturday was cool and sunny, and I explored the waterfront and the Saturday market. Both were excellent places for people watching.
What’s next?
Now I’m back home and October is ending. I’m planning for more adventure to wrap up the year, including time with my cousins and uncle in about a week, followed by a weekend trip to the Twin Cities to see Ben and Sam. I’m still trying to decide if I can make it back to Iowa for Thanksgiving. I’d like to, but plane tickets are pricey and I’m debating the drive instead.
I may have more work travel as well, though it’s not all planned yet. I will probably be in Las Vegas for a meeting in December. After that it’s Christmas, and the year’s end.
Last month I took a Friday off and drove up to Rocky Mountain National Park. I wanted to get out of town for the day and I hadn’t been up in the mountains in quite a while. I also had a rented Zeiss lens that I wanted to spend more time with, and in a place both prettier and more interesting than my neighborhood.
I took a whole mess of pictures, but most of them aren’t very exciting. Still, I was glad to spend the day outside, and even spent a good half hour sitting by a rock on a hillside just kind of taking things in.
It was July 4th weekend, but there was still some snow in the shadier areas at the peak.
There’s a great view from the road over the pass, which is only open in the summer.
A black looking thunderstorm came through in the early afternoon. I came down from a high place earlier than I wanted to, as I was worried about lightning. The storm ending up going past without incident. It made for a nice contrast with the rocks for the short time the sun was still out.
Not long after we got the sun again, and I thought some of the lichen on the rocks was pretty.
It’s been over a month. About time I shared these. The drive out to the park can be kind of frustrating, but it has always been worth it.
